On reaching the spot a startling sight met their eyes. There, perched upon the very stone wall which they had assisted to build, with his arms folded round his knees, and his chin pressed upon the same, with his whole figure drawn up into the smallest compass into which it is possible for the human frame to gather itself, they saw a familiar shape, the sight of which, as they saw it in such an attitude, startled them extremely. It was no other than Captain Corbet. Drawn up thus, folding thus his knees with his arms, leaning thus his chin upon his knees, he came before their startled vision; but he himself was quite unconscious of their presence. His face was turned to the scene which presented itself before him, and his eyes were fixed upon that scene to the exclusion of all other things; and they, as they came up behind him, saw gradually what that scene was. Since they had been there last, the tide had reached its height, and had fallen. Mud Creek now lay before them perfectly empty of water, and presenting to their view an expanse of nothing else except soft, slimy, slippery, oleaginous mud, which now spread away in an impassable gulf, and showed the justice and the truth of that uneuphonious name. But the vast abyss of soft, slimy, and oleaginous mud, and the wide impassable valley composed thereof, and the rise and the fall of these extraordinary tides, were not the attractions which riveted the gaze of Captain Corbet, and the eyes of the boys of the “B. O. W. C.,” as they drew nearer. It was something far different--something, in fact, which touched them all, in common, with a deep feeling of sorrow,--a feeling which was strong enough to make Captain Corbet unconscious of the presence of any except himself, and to make the boys stop short in their advance, and look on in deep but mournful silence.